Thursday, 17 October 2013

16/10/2013 Stage 45 San Salvador de Jujuy - Salta

Getting out of
Juyuy was the usual big city rush hour traffic madness with us on a
three lane motorway trying to keep as close to the edge of the road
as possible as there was no ridable hard shoulder. It didn't last
long and we were quickly into the countryside again with such a sharp
contrast from what we had experienced in the desert in Bolivia and
entering into Argentina. It was green and lush in parts and the
freshly fallen snow on the mountain tops reminded us of Scotland. The
parrots flying overhead gave it away though . From Juyuy the main
road joins a huge motorway all the way to Salta but we found a
beautiful single track road over the mountains which was a 800 m
gentle climb through forests and past some lakes. We met a French
group of four cyclists, two of them on a tandem , who had started
their journey of a month the day before and for once we felt that we
were the experienced cyclists and not the newbies.

Into Salta was
interesting as the 2 lane motorway quickly led to a busy road with
“no cycles” signs along the road . There didn't seem to be
anywhere else to go and we couldn't turn back. Two policemen on one
moped passed us and ignored us and we then saw other cyclists
similarly ignoring the signs. Can't imagine we would have got away
with it in the UK.

Salta for me
is probably the prettiest and most interesting city centre so far and
we soon found a plush hotel with evening meal breakfast with air
conditioning for not a lot [now that we had a grip on the exchange
rate].

With a few
hours to spare we explored and fortunately were able to find an
Argentinian airline company office where we could plan the next stage
which will entail a bit of a break and tourism time. A detour via
Iguazu is on the cards. The falls are one of the South American
wonders on the border between Argentina, Brazil and Paraguay and we
feel it would be a shame to miss them.